A New Era
by Chu-Chi Face
Summary: The Doctor travels forward in time but only to discover the tragedy of Rose Tyler's death. As he is left to pick up the pieces of his shattered life only Freya can help him...First DW fic so be nice! Chap 4 now up!
1. Chapter 1

A solitary girl stood silently at a grave, tears cascading dwon her cheeks. She was too deeply imersed in her sorrow to notice the tall, slender, figure of a man, standing a little way behind her. Watching her. He looked on solemnly, a great sadness enrapturing his two hearts.

"How is Rose Tyler dead?" he suddenly said, his voice breaking the absloute silence in the empty cemetary. The girl turned round, still crying.

"Who...are you?" she stuttered, pausing to wipe her eyes on her sleeve.

"I'm the Doctor," the stranger replied calmly, pacing forward so he was standing at the grave with the girl. Up close, she could see he was desperately trying to fight back tears, as he read the plaque marking where Rose Tyler was buried.

**Here lies Rose Tyler**

**Died aged only forty**

**Beloved mother, daughter and friend.**

_Mother,_ thought the Doctor, surely she hadn't had children with another man? But then he choked back a sob as he remembered...he had left her. Why did she have any reason not to have been with someone else? _Because she loved me, and I loved her, so why did I let her go? If I hadn't she might not be...But then she was a human, she couldn't live forever...but Rose was different. I should never have let her go..._

But the Doctor was determined not to cry in front of this girl. He wished she would go, he just wanted to mourn in peace. "So, umm...Doctor. How did you know my mum?" the girl asked, unfazed by his silent brooding. The Doctor froze, this girl was Rose's daughter. As he looked at her properly he could now see the very obvious resemblances he had been so blind to before.

"We were good friends, very good friends. Inseparable." he said at last, with a small smile.

"Really?" Rose's daughter raised her eyebrows at him, just like she used to do. "Well I haven't seen you before. Are you sure it's this Rose Tyler?" The Doctor nodded.

"But I knew her years back. Before you were born."

"You don't look nearly old enough though...you must have been way younger than her!" the girl exclaimed. The Doctor suppressed a snort.

"If you say so, and by the way, I didn't catch your name."

"Freya," she replied. The Doctor smiled at her.

It was a very nice smile. Freya noted, but it didn't completely mask the sadness and grief he was feeling. "I'm very sorry if you and my mum were close," Freya said and she grabbed his hand and squeezed it. He squeezed her hand back as his eyes misted over, with happy memories of Rose, she presumed. Now she had a good chance to inspect him in more detail. The Doctor was fairly tall and wore a long, brown trenchcoat over a pinstripe suit completed by a pair of black and white training shoes. He had floppy brown hair and was quite good-looking, but for some unexplainable reason Freya wasn't attacted to him.

"So how did my Rose die? And tell me the truth Freya," he growled sternly as he turned to face her. He had a look of regret and anguish that seemed oddly out of place for someone who had been out of contact with her mother for nearly twenty years.

"She...she slit her wrists in the bath just after Christmas. It was always a hard time for both her nad Gran." Freya tried to blink back fresh tears. "And now it is for me too," she finished, voice trembling.

Suddenly the Doctor flung his arms around her and pulled her close to him, and let her sob freely into his shoulder. Gingerly he started to stroke her shoulder-length blonde hair. "Let's go for a walk, eh?" he whispered to her and she slowly let him walk her away.


	2. Chapter 2

The Doctor and Freya walked side-by-side down the street of an all-too-familiar estate away from the cemetary. "Why'd your mother kill herself Freya?" he asked her, dreading the answer.

"Because of my father," she replied stiffly. The Doctor felt slightly relieved- it hadn't been because of him. Still, he felt a slight pang at the fact that she had managed to get over him so quickly. He wished he could say the same for her. He sighed. Freya must have been born less than a year after he took Rose home for the final time, as she looked around twenty. Unless...he quickly shook his head. He was being stupid. Freya couldn't possibly be his daughter...could she?

"Tell me more about your father, Freya," the Doctor said. "But only if you want to," he added quickly.

"I don't really know much about him, he left my mum before I was born. But Mum never said anything bad about him, ever. Gran sure did though," Freya paused to chuckle to herself. "Mum always hoped he would come back and visit one day, she said she would always love him."

The Doctor nodded encouragingly for her to continue, but inside he was breaking up. There was no doubt about it, Freya was his daughter. His and Rose's daughter. Why hadn't she told him she was pregnant? _Maybe then we could've been a proper family...maybe. _

"Oh yeah, my mum said Dad was a doctor, like you. Doctor John Smith I think," she shrugged, and hoisted herself up onto the brick wall which they were now standing next to. The Doctor frantically scrabbled in his coat pocket for his scrap of psychic paper. Freya watched him curiously, she was growing to like this weird doctor. He had turned up so mysteriously and claimed to be an old friend of her mum's. Normally she would have done a runner as soon as he had approached her, but strangely enough she had this gut feeling she could trust him.

"Aha!" he suddenly yelled triumphantly, uncrumpling and extremely unimportant-looking piece of paper in his hands. He held it out proudly for Freya to read. It was a licence that said: **'Doctor John Smith, University of Gallifrey.' **Her heart stopped for a moment, out of sheer disbelief. She looked up, wide-eyed, at the now grinning Doctor, before saying breathlessly, "Dad?"

_Not really a cliffhanger but I hope you enjoyed it! I'm actually enjoying writing this story, believe it or not, so stay tuned for the next instalment soon! xxx_


	3. Chapter 3

The Doctor nodded happily and Freya leapt down off the wall and they embraced, both laughing. He lifted her up and twirled her round and round. He never wanted to let her go, she was _his daughter._ Then the pair strode off down the street, hand in hand, eyes glistening with joy.

"So you're my father? The guy who Mum loved so much..." Freya mused aloud, but then her face went rigid. "Why did you never come back for her?" The Doctoe let go of her hand and shifted uneasily. This was going to be the hard part. The explanation.

"Freya...it's complicated. Perhaps we could go get a cup of tea or something and I'll do my best to explain everything." Eventually the pair ended up at the back corner table of the Porcupine Palomino cafè, a favourite place picked by Freya.

"Gran used to take me here when I was little," Freya told the Doctor as she looked around smiling.

"Talking of which, how is Jackie? Sounds to me she's the same as she always was," the Doctor asked. Freya glanced at him sadly.

"She died two years ago."

"Oh...well, I 'm so sorry...I didn't know...I'm so sorry..." Freya flashed him a quick smile that said 'I'ts okay'. Luckily then their drinks arrived and the good-looking waiter winked flirtatiously at Freya. The Doctor gave him such viscious evils as he walked away it made her splutter with laugter into her coffee.

"Oh my god! I'm acting like a **real** daddy already!" he said disbelievingly, shaking his head. "Sorry Freya."

"No matter. I would never go out with Dickey Smith anyway."

"Dickey Smith?" the Doctor mused aloud questioningly, "Any relation to Mickey Smith by any chance?"

"Yeah, his cousin. No one's seen Mickey for like, fifteen years. Ever since he went off to find some Sarah Jane to help Mum with her depression. Caused by you. So are you going to tell me 'everything' or aren't you?"

Freya meaned back in her seat expectantly. The Doctor twiddled his thumbs for a moment or two before he started. "I'm going to start from the beginning, where all good stories should start. There are some parts your small half-humanoid brain may force you into not believing, but I assure you, it is all the absolute truth. Well Freya, I am a Time Lord, the last of the Time Lords, from a planet in this Universe called Gallifrey. There was a huge war, known as the Time War, that destroyed my home and my people. All I have is the TARDIS. Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. It's kinda like a spaceship, but it looks like a blue nineteen-fifties police box. Strange, I know. Anyway I travel through space and time saving the universe, there is no other purpose to my life. I always like to have an assistant, to help me and keep me sane." At this point the Doctor had a good laugh before he carried on, flipping his floppy fringe out of his eyes.

"Anyway, Rose Tyler was my most recent companion, and I knew I was in love with her the first time I held her hand and told her to run. Of course that was during my ninth incarnation."

Freya frowned at him quzzically. "Oh yeah, instead of ageing Time Lords regenerate into a different person. We can cheat death. Comes in quite handy actually. So, Rose and I travelled together for a while and that was great. Really, it was. But all too soon I realised that the love between us was getting too serious. Too dangerous. You have to understand Freya, Rose eventually would have withered and died of old age, and I couldn't bear to endure that nightmare. It was the most painful thing I've ever had to do, but I had to take her home, for the last time. Since then I've been so lonely, so miserable you cannot possibly imagine."

The Doctor leaned in closer to Freya, his eyes dark with pain and his voice was now barely above a whisper. "After a while I thought I would just kind of snoop around, to see how she was coping, praying that she would move on with her own life.How wrong was I." He forced a small smile and leant back in his seat. "Why the HELL did I leave her?" he suddenly shouted and started sobbing.

Freya got up and sat next to him, wrapping her arms around him in a tight hug. "Shh...you have me now, don't you?" she whispered into his ear. He nodded and she passed him a napkin, which he proceeded to blow his nose on. "So...umm, you're telling me my dad is a time-travelling alien?" The Doctor grimaced through his tears and nodded again. "I always knew I was different," Freya shrugged, and then smiled cheekily at her father.


	4. Chapter 4

_Sorry I haven't updated for so long! I've been having a major bout of writer's block! Here's the latest chapter. Enjoy..._

"What d'ya mean 'different'" the Doctor asked as they strolled to Freya's own flat on Powell Estate from the cafe.

"I've never really fitted in with like, other people at school and gym club even though I try. I can't help that I'm naturally top at everything, even sport! Did you know when I started secondary school they had to move me up a year?"

"That's the Gallifreyan in you; extremely intelligent, quick, logical, very agile...Also very sharp senses too." the Doctor explained, Freya nodding along enthusiastically.

"So are you going to take me home to live with you in the TARDIS? 'Cos I certainly have nothing to live for here now Mum's dead. Freya said softly.

"Are you sure? Don't you have people who need you here? A boyfriend or close mate maybe? Or do you go to college or something?"

Freya sadly shook her head. "There's no one to miss me, except my old gymnastics trainer, I was her star pupil." For a moment her face seemed to glow with pride. "And I can't afford to live and go to college at the same time. My job at the local chippy barely pays the rent as it is."

"So you wanna rough it with your old man then? You wanna visit places and meet people, and _things_, you couldn't imagine in your wildest daydreams!"

Freya's eyes had begun to sparkle with excitement as she pulled the Doctor into the tower block after her by his arm. The Doctor sighed happily, she truly was her mother's daughter. "C'mon you can help me pack right now!" Freya laughed.

Soon enough Freya had all the stuff she needed squidged neatly into two suitcases and a rucksack. She hurriedly scribbled a note to the landlady saying that she wouldn't be coming back. Then the Doctor grabbed her cases and the pair of them walked through Powell Estate for the last time.

"We will come and visit my mum's grave though, won't we?" Freya asked as they approached the police call box.

"Of course we will," he replied reassuringly, as he took out a key from his jacket pocket and unlocked the TARDIS door. He pushed it wide open and gestured inside. "Welcome to the TARDIS!" he exclaimed proudly.

Tentatively Freya stepped inside, not quite sure what to expect. "Oh. My. God." were the only words she could get out as she took in the sight of her new home for the very first time.

"I knew you'd like it!" the Doctor chuckled happily as he skipped in after her, slamming the door shut behind him.

"It certainly is, erm, more spacious inside that it looks," Freya stuttered, gesturing around the huge control room they were in. It was littered with numerous pipes, wires and flashing lights, and in the centre stood the massive, mushroom-shaped device that controlled every function of the TARDIS.

The Doctor nodded in agreement. "Clever bit of Gallifreyan technology. Groovy, isn't it?" Freya suddenly broke out into a broad grin, and so did the Doctor. Even now, Freya was beginning to wonder what adventures lay ahead for them...now she had started her new life.


End file.
